Patent shows Google is, or was, thinking about smart watches

A flip-up display and augmented reality are proposed features.

According to the Financial Times, Google may be working on yet another wearable computer in addition to Google Glass: a smart watch similar to the ones Samsung and Apple apparently have in the works. A patent application filed by Google in 2011 describes a watch with a “flip up portion” that includes a top display when open that acts as a supplement to the base of the watch, which presumably also includes a screen.

In addition to the flip-up portion, the watch would also include a touchscreen display and a camera as well as the typical mobile device drivers like a processor and “wireless transceiver.” Google makes specific note that the flip-up display would be concealed when the watch is closed.

The watch would be able to display e-mail messages, geographical location, and direction information, and it sounds like the camera would be able to effect some kind of augmented reality: “the processor is configured to activate an image retrieval system that generates information related to an image captured by the camera when the flip up portion is in the open position.”

I feel like a complete luddite because I just plain don't "get" smart watches. Other than the standard Dick Tracy videophone idea, what practical application do they have that isn't served much better by a smartphone?

I'm not trying to come off as a jerk here, I'm actually curious. Obviously all these companies think there's a big untapped market for smart watches but I just don't see any actual practical applications for them. Please prove me wrong and pitch me some cool app ideas so I can justify buying another expensive gadget.

The company that will get my money out of these wearable computers will be the one who can get the interface right.

I was thinking about something the other night and wanted to look it up on wikipedia, but that involved walking across the room, picking a device up and searching (which I did, I'm not that lazy). But really the goal is to get information to my brain in the simplest form possible, I don't look it up in a book anymore, nor do I sit down at a PC on a desk, I pick up a tablet laying around or pull my phone out of my pocket.

Glasses and watches are the next step, having the data right there, either on my wrist or infront of my eyes. And that's great and all, but it's the interface that matters. My smartphone has led me to talking less, I make less phone calls and email/IM more, suddenly everyone seems to want me talking more with Siri and the like (or talking to my glasses in public). I'm not an introvert, I'm just not someone who's comfortable with talking to himself in public. I'm also not down with learning to type with one hand on a watch. So if a company gets around that problem, I'll be all in.

Eventually I just want to think of a search query and get the answer pumped into my brain though, I'm sure it'll happen one day (until my mind gets hacked).

I feel like a complete luddite because I just plain don't "get" smart watches. Other than the standard Dick Tracy videophone idea, what practical application do they have that isn't served much better by a smartphone?

I'm not trying to come off as a jerk here, I'm actually curious. Obviously all these companies think there's a big untapped market for smart watches but I just don't see any actual practical applications for them. Please prove me wrong and pitch me some cool app ideas so I can justify buying another expensive gadget.

Legitimate questions. Generally speaking, anything the phone can do, but while freeing up the hands to do something else.

I think the Pebble demonstrated that despite tepid sales of previous products, there is a great demand for an excellent smartwatch. The problem has been limitations of the technology and of design. But manufacturers had misinterpreted those tepid sales as disinterest in the form factor.

We are getting to the point where the technology is no longer too limiting to make a decent smartwatch. The question is whether the design is there. The Pebble had the advantage that, by using crowdfunding for an unfinished product, it didn't actually have to work.... (Though maybe it now turns out that it does? I don't know, not important to my point.) I think it remains to be seen whether a real product can achieve what people are looking for.

It's a pretty safe bet that between Apple, Google, Samsung, LG, Pebble, and whoever else, we are going to have a bunch of products to choose from. Also, some of them will be crap. But maybe some will be great...

I feel like a complete luddite because I just plain don't "get" smart watches. Other than the standard Dick Tracy videophone idea, what practical application do they have that isn't served much better by a smartphone?

I'm not trying to come off as a jerk here, I'm actually curious. Obviously all these companies think there's a big untapped market for smart watches but I just don't see any actual practical applications for them. Please prove me wrong and pitch me some cool app ideas so I can justify buying another expensive gadget.

Until recently, I too had a hard time understanding the practicality of smart-watches. Then I got a Galaxy Note 2. The usefulness of a wrist-mounted device that provides remote audio playback controls and access to simple messages has since then been more obvious to me.

Really curious to see what all these companies will put together. Personally I am more hyped by glass. The view augmentation looks like it has more use cases. Glass looks like a revolutionary device. Its sole but huge problem: it looks silly. But the more I see the cooler it gets. A heads up display for navigation in your glasses? How amazing is this.

A watch is more standard but unless they can take away the need to carry around a cellphone completely it's pretty much useless. Currently I use my cell phone as a watch even though I have one on the wrist. But that one is more jewelry.

I feel like a complete luddite because I just plain don't "get" smart watches. Other than the standard Dick Tracy videophone idea, what practical application do they have that isn't served much better by a smartphone?

Instead of having to get my smartphone while jogging to look at the pace, HR, etc I can use an samrt watch like a Pebble linked to the smartphone. Just one example

But how about Sony? They have a Smartwatch our for years, before Samsung, Apple or Google.

They probably have some type of licenses over it.

The problem with Sony is that they have everything but they (with the exception of the Playstation) never go all in. Their watch looks ok but there is no marketing no guarantee it will survive another year most likely no sales and the whole thing doesn't look sexy.

And that it needs the functionality is not that important but it needs to be a status symbol you want to show off. Apple at least gets that

Patenting something you did not created or even produce yet, even while others have produced early concepts is exactly how Apple has patented almost everything they have or own and then sue others for this patents.

This just shows how broken the patent system is. In this case, not only Sony but allot of other companies have produced Smartwatches before, and now Google tries to patent something on them?

I´m 100% sure that Apple is also patenting some watch related stuff, and Im confident they are doing this for something that already is invented and produced, but since they are the first to patent they will be granted with the patent.

As for smart watches use, there is not much you can do with them but there are some uses for them.

1. Jogging, running, etc. Almost all type of sports can benefit from just looking at your wrist, track speed, distance, there are nice Android apps, and I just hate having to keep the phone in one hand to change music or track speed and distance, etc.

2. I constantly receive critical alerts on my phone, some need to be taken care, some not. Some are not important. Having to pull the phone from your pockets for every message is annoying and disrupting, in particular if you are speaking to someone you have to excuse yourself.

3. Some jobs can benefit for this, for workers that need to use both hands and can´t pull their phones out. Military operations and police officers just to name one.

All a patent actually shows is that whoever was listed on the patent was thinking about smart phones and was able to convince whoever has the authority an Google that there idea was worth the cost of filing a patent. It is certainly possible for patents to be generated by development work. But, in that case, Google would probably have announced or be about ready to announce a product. I don't know how Google works internally. But, in my experience it is common for patents to be generated by a process along the following lines. One simple point is that it does not take much to generate an idea that could be patented. Another basic point is that most technology companies have adopted a policy of regularly generating some target number of patents. To meet that goal they encourage their employees to write patents. In some cases, people may be required to write some patents in order to get promoted. That means people regularly try to think up trendy ideas and convince whoever is their gate keeper on patent applications that the patent is worth the cost of the application.

A watch is more standard but unless they can take away the need to carry around a cellphone completely it's pretty much useless. Currently I use my cell phone as a watch even though I have one on the wrist. But that one is more jewelry.

I think that's the wrong goal. But if the watch can handle 80% of the times you would otherwise pull out your cellphone, I think it will succeed.

Based on the designs I've seen so far (the ones that are plausible, not pie-in-the-sky like holographically projected touchscreens in the air), I don't see anything yet that can even handle 30% of the times you would pull out your cellphone, so I don't see large scale success yet.

Patenting something you did not created or even produce yet, even while others have produced early concepts is exactly how Apple has patented almost everything they have or own and then sue others for this patents.

This just shows how broken the patent system is. In this case, not only Sony but allot of other companies have produced Smartwatches before, and now Google tries to patent something on them?

I´m 100% sure that Apple is also patenting some watch related stuff, and Im confident they are doing this for something that already is invented and produced, but since they are the first to patent they will be granted with the patent.

As for smart watches use, there is not much you can do with them but there are some uses for them.

1. Jogging, running, etc. Almost all type of sports can benefit from just looking at your wrist, track speed, distance, there are nice Android apps, and I just hate having to keep the phone in one hand to change music or track speed and distance, etc.

2. I constantly receive critical alerts on my phone, some need to be taken care, some not. Some are not important. Having to pull the phone from your pockets for every message is annoying and disrupting, in particular if you are speaking to someone you have to excuse yourself.

3. Some jobs can benefit for this, for workers that need to use both hands and can´t pull their phones out. Military operations and police officers just to name one.

I don't think Google patented the smartwatch concept. At least, I didn't see that in TFA.